User blog:Reaper with no name/Old Stuff 3: Why is Pacific Rim more Popular Internationally than Domestically?
Original Post As of this post, Pacific Rim (with it's budget of $190 million), has raised $227 Million globally. However, only $87 Million of that has been from US theaters (the single biggest market for movies, and the market the movie was originally designed for). The net result is that American audiences generally find the movie somewhat "meh" (despite excellent action, plot, characterization, themes, special effects, and reviews), while international audiences eat it up (many of which don't have as much of a cultural fixation with huge monsters and giant robots as the US does). The question is, why? And before anyone brings up Japan, keep in mind that the movie hasn't even opened there yet. I have my own thoughts on the matter (which will likely lead to a wall of text). Reaper's Response to Himself, Because He Did Not Yet Have a Blog 4 Thinkin' and Talks to Himself a Lot Wall of text time. It's easy to dismiss Pacific Rim's lackluster performance in the United States as the result of poor marketing or Americans having poor taste (the latter of which carries the problematic implication that we, the ones who like the movie, are the arbiters of what is and is not good taste). However, I think there may be more to it than that. I believe Americans might be turned off from the movie by a perceived belief that its central theme of cooperation (details of that here: http://pacificrim.wikia.com/wiki/Thread:4778#50) is in conflict with American ideology. Everyone knows that Americans are big on individualism. What may not be immediately obvious (to the Americans themselves, anyway), is just how closely this idea is associated with the idea of independence. Indeed, for most Americans the two ideas are inseparable. An American is himself, and he doesn't need anyone else. However, it's worth noting that it doesn't have to be this way. It is easy to imagine a person who is clearly an individual, yet is completely dependent on other people (children, for example, as well as the extremely disabled and sometimes the very elderly). The reverse (a person who is independent but not an individual) is much more difficult to imagine, but only because all humans are individuals to begin with, and we have difficulty imagining a truly "alien" mindset. Nevertheless, science fiction (with it's myriad forms of exotic alien life with odd psychologies) and philosophy (consider the philosophical zombie) can give us a few examples. When these two traits are married as strongly as they are in American culture, the emergent trait born from them is something we are all familiar with: rebelliousness. Indeed, rebellions (positive and negative) make up some of the most important events in American history (according to Americans, anyway). It's not hard to imagine why, either. A person cannot fight against things that they are dependent on, and to choose rebellion requires one to believe that their individual ideas and interests are better or more important than those of whatever they are rebelling against. In effect, individualism and independence are necessary for rebellion to exist. These traits are strongly encoded into the Becket brothers during the movie. Raleigh is one of only two pilots to have ever successfully operated a Jaeger solo, and he never stops standing out in the crowd (no matter how much he embraces the spirit of cooperation). Then there's the opening fight scene. Recall that the reason the Gipsy Danger fought Knifehead out in the middle of the ocean instead of at the Miracle Mile was because there was a fishing boat out there that the Beckets wanted to save. What difference did the fight being in the ocean make? None. What difference did the fishing boat make to the story? None. Indeed, we don't even know what happened to it after the fight went south. So why then was the boat put into the story in the first place? The answer is that it gave the Beckets a chance to prove their credentials as rebels who were willing to disobey orders. It allowed them to prove how "American" they were. Of course, I would be remiss to not mention a fourth important American cultural concept (no; it's not "freedom"; that is simply a buzzword Americans like to use to describe the concepts outlined above, when it isn't being used by politicians to trick Americans into doing things that may or may not actually be in their best interest). That concept is the idea of American Exceptionalism, which can be more or less summed up as "America and Americans are just better". It is perhaps the best example of how America is trapped between its twin desires for isolationism and imperialism (as much as it likes to pretend to dislike the latter). American Exceptionalism proves to be the ultimate reconciliation of these two (often opposing) ideas. Why should Americans need to learn or care about the rest of the world? It's not America, the Leader of the Free World, after all, and therefore doesn't matter as much. American Exceptionalism even bleeds into Pacific Rim (despite being clearly tailored for international audiences). The main character is American, and despite his Jaeger being outdated, it still somehow ends up doing all the work (mostly on its own). Even when Striker Eureka and its crew heroically sacrifice themselves to clear a path for Gipsy Danger to finish the mission (when the roles were originally planned as nearly the reverse), Slattern still survives, allowing Gipsy Danger to finish it off (which leads to the same result, except that the American Jaeger yet again takes more of the spotlight). To an American audience, this is likely just an example of the main character getting the spotlight (and that the main character just happens to be American). However, international audiences might not see it the same way. But regardless of the impact American Exceptionalism has on the movie, there is still the issue of potential conflict between the movies central theme (cooperation) and the American ideals of individualism and independence. No culture (no, not even America) responds well when they believe their fundamental ideologies are being attacked (see: politics). Feudal Japan had a policy of killing foreign missionaries, because they were viewed as a threat to Japanese culture. American labor unions were often harassed because people associated workers' rights with communisim, and communism was viewed as a threat to the American way. Americans are trained by their culture (perhaps rightly so, or perhaps not, but that is so far outside the scope of this discussion it's not even funny) to fear collectivism with a passion rivalling the pathological. Therefore, anything that could be construed as related or leading to it is likely to provoke a harsh rejection by Americans. And it is not hard for Americans to imagine cooperation (where people work towards a common goal) leading to or being related to collectivism (where the individual's needs are ignored in favor of society's). However, Pacific Rim ultimately shows that the choice between ineffective individualism and conformist collectivism is a false one. None of the characters in the movie ever give up their individualism or independence by working together as a team. Indeed, most of them become stronger individuals as a result of their shared struggles. Gottlieb becomes a better scientist by embracing one of Newt's crazy experiments, and is able to use the data from it to repair his flawed theory. Raleigh and Mako are both able to resolve their own personal dilemnas through their connection to each other. Raleigh himself is shown proving symbolically that he is perfectly capable of functioning on his own when he is able to defeat Knifehead alone (however difficult and traumatic the experience). However, this does not stop him from cooperating with others to make himself significantly more effective, and it doesn't prevent him from performing the last step of saving the world (initiating a nuclear meltdown in Gipsy Danger) by himself. Stacker Pentecost is such a powerful individual that he holds the entire PPDC together in its darkest days, and yet he is also able to drift with Chuck Hansen without any practice simply because he is able to leave his ego and personal problems at the door. The Kaiju prove to be a problem that cannot be solved by any one man. When mankind breaks apart in its hour of need and pins its hopes on isolated individual efforts (in the form of walls), they are smashed by the Kaiju, who are themselves an odd inversion of the idea of individualism and cooperation coexisting (the Kaiju's efforts are individual in nature, yet they share minds and genetic structure; this is in direct opposition to humans, who are individuals that come together to act as one). But, when many individuals come together, the Kaiju can be fought. The differences between individuals function not as a barrier to cooperation, but an asset. Gipsy Danger's nature as an analog Jaeger proves to be a significant advantage that no one could have seen coming. By the end of the movie, the final two Jaeger teams include one American man with a Japanese woman, and a British man with an Australian one. And yet, against all reason, this setup proves to be superbly effective in the final battle. All of this teaches us that working together and forging connections with other people doesn't require us to give up who we are or become dependent on someone else. It shows us that it is possible for individuals to come together as equals, and agree to coordinate their efforts to solve their mutual problems. Indeed, not only does the movie show us that there isn't any conflict between individualism and cooperation, but it also feeds into an ideal of American culture I have thus far left out: Equality. Perhaps more than any other aspect of their country, Americans are proud of their ideal that all people should be treated the same under the law, and that all people (regardless of race, gender, or creed) should possess the same rights and opportunity to contribute to society using their own unique skills. For Americans living in an age of political paralysis, there is also a further lesson to be gleaned; one that Americans already know but often forget. It lies at the heart of the theory behind the American system of government. It is the concept that diversity makes people stronger, not weaker, so long as both sides sit at the table of compromise and make an honest effort to tackle their mutual problems together. Hmmm...With that much applicability, I may have just undercut my original thesis. Perhaps Americans really do just have poor taste. Except me, of course, because I'm exceptional like that. Category:Blog posts